REVIEWS

Die Drahtlose Telegraphie im internen Recht und Völkerrecht, von Dr. F. Meili. Zurich, 1908, pp. 100.

The indefatigable pen of Professor Meili has now sketched out the present legal position of wireless telegraphy. His first publication, issued in 1871, was on the law of the Telegraph, and it is appropriate that he should now, with ripened experience and power, take up the newest branch of it,-newest, at least, as a living thing, though the beginnings of a theory of the possibility of such a service by the air date back to 1838 (p. 10). Germany has been the most prolific in names for the new art: Funkentelegraphie, Telegraphie mit Hertzischen Wellen, Telegraphie ohne Leitungsdraht, drahtlose Telegraphie, and Wellen-telegraphie. Dr. Meili adopts the simplest and most expressive term, corresponding to that in use in England and the United States.

The treatise describes separately the legal aspects of wireless telegraphy in a particular country, and its legal aspects in respect to international concerns. The latter are of most interest to Americans, and for many purposes are to be determined, under a convention to which the United States were a party, on and after July 1, 1908, by certain rules specifically prescribed. This convention (which is given by Dr. Meili at length, p. 81) was made in Berlin in 1906 between twenty-seven powers. Of these, nineteen are European, six American, and two Asiatic. Russia, content with its provisions, did not include wireless telegraphy among the subjects to be specially considered at the second Peace Conference at the Hague in 1907, though it received some attention in framing the Convention as to Land and Naval Warfare (p. 62).

The author does not assent to the paradox of Rolland that (p. 48) in approaching this topic the earth may well be regarded as a mere support for the air, since the main actions of men which their goverments regulate take place in the air and above the ground. This he dismisses as overstrained. There must be a separate division of international law for what takes place in the air, das völkerrechtliche Luftrecht. Its first proposition must be that the air is free. Its second must be that it is, nevertheless, under the control of the power governing the earth beneath it for certain purposes, to a certain height. But to what height? Can we seek an analogy in the three-mile limit of territorial waters? Can we adopt Rolland's position (p. 49) that 330 meters should be the boundary of terrestrial police? And what of the air over the high seas? Does a mare liberum below involve a free air above?

Dr. Meili is disposed to agree with the Institute of International law that each country must be conceded a regulative power over the air, as high as may be necessary, to forbid the passage of hertzian waves above its territory or its territorial waters, (pp. 52, 65). Several powers have already asserted that it must also be free to regulate or prohibit the use of wireless telegraphic apparatus on its ships, public or private (p. 55), even in time of peace.

The kernel of the Berlin Convention of 1906 he deems (p. 70) to be the provision (Art. 3) that wireless stations, whether on the coast or on board ship, must exchange messages reciprocally without discrimination between different systems.

Like all Dr. Meili's works, this bears mark of a careful study of the literature of the subject treated of, and is clearly expressed and orderly in arrangement. S. E. B.

Federal Usurpation. By Franklin Pierce. New York. D. Appleton & Company. 1908.

Pages 437.

In a book equally interesting to the layman and the practitioner, Mr. Pierce has discussed the growing tendency towards the centralization of power in the Federal Goverment by executive action and judicial interpretation. The book is, to use the words of the author, "a plea for the sacredness of the Constitution of the United States;" a plea, not that the Constitution as adopted a hundred and twenty years ago should remain unaltered, but that if it requires amendment to meet the changed conditions of to-day, it should be changed in the manner intended by the framers and by them provided, namely, formal amendment.

Mr. Pierce discusses the question of usurpation by the Federal Government from a historical standpoint as well as that of the present day. The usurpations in the Civil War and Reconstruction Period are graphically reviewed; the words and acts of President Roosevelt, which tend to abrogate the rights of the states and centralize the power in the National Government are criticised; the danger of paternalism is pointed out. The great power of the United States Supreme Court, the Interstate Commerce Clause, and other questions of universal interest are examined. In short, the book is an interesting review of the different phases and aspects of the present tendency towards imperialism and centralization.

The author, however, does not leave us without a remedy, and he discusses what should be done, from his point of view, in order "to restore the Democratic Republic

"

In view of the present growing interest in the powers given to the Federal Government by the Constitution, Mr. Pierce's book is especially timely. Whether or not one agrees with the views of the author, whether or not one feels his attitude to be the correct one and his criticisms just, yet in any event one cannot help but find the book interesting and the questions discussed meat for thought. R. C. H.

SCHOOL AND ALUMNI NOTES

By the death of Mrs. Mary A. K. Lines, widow of Augustus E. Lines, of New Haven, recently, a trust fund amounting to $50,000, which was bequeathed to Yale by Mr. Lines at the time of his death some years ago, giving his wife a life interest in that sum, was released and will come to Yale as a permanent fund, the income to be applied for the endowment and maintenance of a professorship in the Department of Law, which professorship shall be designated as a professorship of testamentary law.

By the will of Mrs. Mary E. Ives, who died recently, in New Haven, a bequest of $5,000 was made to the Yale Law School for its library.

Professor Simon E. Baldwin was the guest of honor and a speaker at the annual dinner of the Yale Alumni Association held February 19th, at the University Club of Brooklyn, N. Y.

The Joseph Parker Prize, of the value of one hundred and twenty-five dollars, established by the will of Miss Eliza T. Parker in 1898, is offered for the best thesis on a subject connected with Roman Law. This prize is open to any member of the School at graduation from either the undergraduate or graduate course.

Parker theses must be handed to the Secretary of the Law School on or before May 1, 1908. For the year 1908, competitors may write on any one of the following subjects:

The Roman Roots of the Institution of the Jury.

2. Code Theodosius I, II, de Jurisdictione et ubiquis conveniri debeat.

3. Evolution and Scope of the Roman Law of Evidence.

4. Comparison of the Legal Status of the Roman Peregrini with that of the Native Inhabitants of the U. S. Colonies of Spanish Origin.

Students preferring to investigate any other subject in Roman Law of equal difficulty and importance, may be allowed to substitute that, with the approval of Professor Baldwin.

The Law School has recently obtained by purchase three very rare sets of law records, one of them the only set on the market

in the world. The sets consist of the complete law reports of New Zealand, Ceylon and South Australia. Each set of the records is bound in a number of large volumes and makes a valuable addition to the present very complete collection of law records owned by the Law School Library.

A most successful series of Storrs lectures was concluded at the Law School last week. Hon. William Dameron Guthrie, '04 Hon., one of the prominent lawyers of New York City, spoke on "The Original Jurisdiction of the Supreme Court of the United States and the Eleventh Amendment." The lectures were given in Hendrie Hall at 5 o'clock on afternoons from February 24 to 28 inclusive. There was a large attendance at all the lectures and interest shown especially among the students in the Law Department. Chief Justice David J. Brewer, '56, will deliver the Storrs lectures next year.

Plans for the Law School Commencement exercises are now practically completed: The alumni meeting and dinner, followed by informal speaking by representative alumni of the School, will take place in Hendrie Hall at 12:30 on Monday afternoon, June The alumni meeting will be followed by the Townsend prize speaking and at 2 o'clock on Monday afternoon the address before the graduating class of the Law School will be delivered by Hon. John W. Foster, '96 Hon., of Washington, D. C., a former Secretary of State.

22.

'76-Hon. Victor H. Metcalf is one of the subjects in an interesting sketch of Yale men in Washington, in the Alumni Weekly of March 11th.

'89-Bissel Thomas was one of the speakers at the recent Alumni dinner at Seattle, Wash.

'92-Hon. Francis W. Treadway was recently nominated for lieutenant-governor of Ohio by the Ohio Republican State Con

vention.

'93-Major John W. Tilson was one of the speakers at the Southern Club banquet which was held on Lincoln's Birthday at the University Club, New Haven. Charles Mitchell Armstrong, '08 L., is the President of the Southern Club.

'95-The annual report of Herbert Knox Smith, U. S. Commissioner of Corporations, to the Secretary of Commerce and

Labor, has just been issued from the Government Printing Office in Washington.

'95-Albert H. Barclay, who for the past six years has been associated in the practice of law with William H. Ely, under the firm name of Ely & Barclay, has opened an office for the general practice of law in his own name at 48 Church Street, New Haven, Conn.

'95-George W. Klett is a practicing lawyer with offices at 277 Main Street, New Britain, Conn.

'or-A daughter was born on February 15th to Mr. and Mrs. Philip H. Kunzig at their new residence, 6020 Morton Street, Germantown, Pa. Mr. Kunzig will be remembered as a captain of the 'Varsity Crew when at the University.

'or-W. R. Wilson's address is 1868 East Eighty-ninth Street, Cleveland, Ohio.

'04-John H. Sears announces the removal of his offices from No. 328 Missouri Trust Building to suite 1412-1413 Third National Bank Building, St. Louis, Missouri.

'04-Joseph H. Banigan's address is 244 Angell Street, Providence, R. I.

'05-John L. Bunce has been appointed assistant clerk of the Police Court at Hartford, Conn.

'06-A son was born recently to Mr. and Mrs. James N. H. Campbell of Hartford, Conn.

'07-Newell Jennings has been appointed superintendent of schools at Bristol, Conn., in place of Charles L. Wooding, '93, resigned.

'07-George C. Howard has entered the practice of law with William J. Baker, Counselor at Law, with offices at 830 Powers Block, Rochester, N. Y.

'07-Robert Burton is engaged in the general practice of law with offices in the Pennington County Bank Building, Rapid City, South Dakota.